You're listening to the Fitness Matters Podcast with Pahla B, and this is episode number 264, "Permission to Change". Welcome to the Fitness Matters Podcast, where every week we talk about the fitness matters that matter to you. I'm Pahla B, YouTuber, certified life and weight loss coach, soon to be author and your best middle aged fitness friend. Are you ready to talk about the fitness mindset that matters to you? Me too. Let's go.
Real quick before we get into today's topic, I want to invite you to join the Pahla B Wellness Over 50 Book Club in partnership with CHIRP audio books. The book we're reading for November and December is The Wisdom of Your Body by Hillary McBride, which you can grab a steep discount with no monthly subscription fees at chirpbooks.com/pahla. That's P-A-H-L-A. While you're there, be sure to click the follow button to get exclusive access updates and register for the Live Book Club event on Friday, December 16th. I'll see you there.
Hello. Hello, goal friend. I'm so happy to be here with you this week and I have for us today, a particularly, I'm going to say different kind of episode. Most of the time I feel like I offer you some kind of theory, some kind of model, some kind of thinking point or a concept, and then I try to also include practical steps for how to apply it in your life. And every now and again, I'll do like a listical 12 things to think about. I can't come up with anything that front off the top of my head. I've really only done what maybe two or three listical episodes. Today, however is completely different from both of those and also something that I don't do very often. But I tell you what I needed this one today. Today is just a straight up pep talk.
I am making changes and my brain would love to offer me in that sentence that I am making a lot of changes. I'm changing everything. I'm doing so much to change right now. My brain is also offering me that change is hard. Change feels difficult. Change feels scary and weird. And none of those things are true. Those are all thoughts, but I am having them and therefore this pep talk is for me. But it occurred to me that perhaps this pep talk might be the kind of thing that you need to hear, if not necessarily today, then at some point in time, in your goal getting journey.
Here's the thing, you have permission to change and sometimes it doesn't feel like it because of all the thoughts that we have about change. You have, however, implicit permission from, I'm going to throw out a couple of words here, you're welcome to pick the one that works for you or choose a completely different one. You know how I am. I like to offer you my theories, and then I want you to fit the things that I say into your world view, your beliefs, your philosophy, your everything. I am respectful of whatever your world view is and don't like to use a particular word for this kind of thing because I want you to make it work for you.
Here's what I'm saying though. You have implicit permission to change from God, the universe, Mother Nature, or the one that I'm actually going to go with for our conversation today, biology. Biologically you are not only capable of changing, you are actually supposed to. You're supposed to change. We have biological imperatives. I've definitely talked about this before. I tend to talk about it a little bit more in terms of making physical changes, physical adaptations when I'm doing fitness stuff. I talk about how your body makes changes but your brain is also supposed to make changes.
Our biological imperatives, it means it's things that you have to do in order to be a biological specimen here on earth. And all biological specimens, meaning all animals, all plants, all things that are alive on earth behave in these specific ways. Biological imperative number one, is to stay alive. Biological imperative number two, is to reproduce. Biological imperative number three, is to stay the same as much as possible. And biological imperative number four is to change and adapt when necessary so that you can stay the same as much as possible. So the thing is, that staying the same as much as possible really feels like it overrides everything. It really feels like the more important one of the two of these biological imperatives. And yet if you weren't supposed to change, you wouldn't be able to change.
Your brain is supposed to change. It is one of the most malleable and adaptive parts of you. In fact, I would venture to say that it is more adaptable, which is what I meant to say instead of adaptive. It is more adaptable than even your body and your body is very adaptable. But your brain can think new thoughts. Your brain can believe new things. Your brain is changeable. It can take in new factual information and change its mind. It can also simply decide to think something new. You have permission from biology or however else you'd like to think about that, to change your mind, your body, your life, your beliefs, your circumstances, your feelings, everything. You are allowed to change.
And further to that, I encourage you to give yourself explicit permission to change. Here's the thing about explicit permission. I am going to tell you that we all, even though maybe you don't think you do, I know for a fact that I do, therefore, I am making this universal. I think we all are waiting for some kind of permission to change from, I'm just going to blanketly say out there, people we love, people who we identify with in some way in our community, just other people. We want permission from other people to change. And I got to be honest with you, my friends, it is almost never forthcoming.
And here's my theory on why that is. I believe that because of these biological imperatives, to stay the same as much as possible, but also definitely change when necessary, I truly believe that most of us are wandering around on the planet, worried about changes and thinking that changes are scary or hard or we don't want them. And that's fair, completely okay. The truth of it is we can't predict the future. It's the future and there could be consequences to the changes that we make. Totally understand all of the reasons why change feels the way it does.
And here's why I want to offer you that you need to give yourself permission to change is because you are the only person who actually has the power to do so. We would love it if other people gave us permission to change, because then it would feel easier. It would feel like, "Oh, I'm supposed to change". And I realize that our conversation here, I am basically giving you permission to change. You are welcome to hand me that power, but I will encourage you, and I am encouraging myself, to be brave enough to offer yourself explicit permission to change, just because you want to. There is no, out there, standard about who you should be or who you are capable of being or even who you want to be. Those are all yours. That is all your power to do and have what you want, which means that you are the only person who can truly give yourself permission to change in ways to do and be and have what you want. You have implicit permission, and I encourage you to give yourself explicit permission to change.
And I'm not saying that this is going to make it feel easier. I'm not saying that this is going to make it all rainbows and daisies and getting licked by kittens. Which by the way, I say getting licked by kittens all the time, but have you ever been licked by a kitten? They have little sandpaper tongues. It's actually a little bit rough, but also very sweet and pleasant at the same time. You have permission to change. Go grant yourself permission to change.
And like always, I hope this was helpful. Thank you for listening, and I'll talk to you again soon.
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